Peg Bowden - Blogger Extraordinaire
June 22, 2013 by Judith Whipple
Updated January 12, 2021 by Tucson Daily Star: "Margaret Bowden"
“If you’re in the U.S, you have to get involved. I’m retired and available to jump in the car and just do it,” Peg thought.
By May 2013, more than 3,000 folks from 28 countries were reading Peg Bowden’s eloquent pictorial blog about El Comedor, a Jesuit-run refuge for deported migrants in Nogales, Sonora. Sixty percent are regulars, including U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva.
“What’s a blog?,” wondered Peg initially when her artist daughter set up www.arroya.org. For Peg, a personal one-year commitment to El Comedor soon became open-ended, yielding not just the blog but also a book. Fellow Samaritan Charles Burkholder says, “Peg combines compassion with objectivity to tell a factual story.”
A bit of a perfect storm led Peg to the Green Valley/Sahuarita Samaritans. Soon after the 2011 shooting of Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, she came across a copy of “Crossing With the Virgin” and noted the entries for the Samaritans. Then, in a matter of days, she found herself at the Annual Border Issues Fair, speaking to actual Samaritans and signing up for the first of many Searches, daily drives to locate migrants in trouble.
“If you’re in the U.S, you have to get involved. I’m retired and available to jump in the car and just do it,” Peg thought.
With Samaritans, she’s also dropped water along migrant trails, picked up items migrants were forced to leave behind in the desert and witnessed Operation Streamline, the daily court trial of shackled migrants at the Federal Building in Tucson.
Peg and husband Lester Weil moved to Tucson from Ashland, Oregon, in 2002. A retired public health nurse, Peg is a painter, piano player and percussionist (once Tucson Symphony’s youngest). She and Lester are members of the Green Valley Concert Band. A board member of the Santa Cruz Community Foundation, Peg mentors two post-graduate students. She just traveled to Oaxaca for Spanish immersion.
However, Peg concentrates on serving El Comedor with clothing and compassion. Every Tuesday morning without fail. She often asks herself, “What does this effort mean?” Then, speaking with yet another weary migrant, she asks permission to photograph and heads home to write another account of the real border.
Our beloved Peg died on December 27, 2020. Celebrate her inspiring life by reading Peg's obituary.
By May 2013, more than 3,000 folks from 28 countries were reading Peg Bowden’s eloquent pictorial blog about El Comedor, a Jesuit-run refuge for deported migrants in Nogales, Sonora. Sixty percent are regulars, including U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva.
“What’s a blog?,” wondered Peg initially when her artist daughter set up www.arroya.org. For Peg, a personal one-year commitment to El Comedor soon became open-ended, yielding not just the blog but also a book. Fellow Samaritan Charles Burkholder says, “Peg combines compassion with objectivity to tell a factual story.”
A bit of a perfect storm led Peg to the Green Valley/Sahuarita Samaritans. Soon after the 2011 shooting of Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, she came across a copy of “Crossing With the Virgin” and noted the entries for the Samaritans. Then, in a matter of days, she found herself at the Annual Border Issues Fair, speaking to actual Samaritans and signing up for the first of many Searches, daily drives to locate migrants in trouble.
“If you’re in the U.S, you have to get involved. I’m retired and available to jump in the car and just do it,” Peg thought.
With Samaritans, she’s also dropped water along migrant trails, picked up items migrants were forced to leave behind in the desert and witnessed Operation Streamline, the daily court trial of shackled migrants at the Federal Building in Tucson.
Peg and husband Lester Weil moved to Tucson from Ashland, Oregon, in 2002. A retired public health nurse, Peg is a painter, piano player and percussionist (once Tucson Symphony’s youngest). She and Lester are members of the Green Valley Concert Band. A board member of the Santa Cruz Community Foundation, Peg mentors two post-graduate students. She just traveled to Oaxaca for Spanish immersion.
However, Peg concentrates on serving El Comedor with clothing and compassion. Every Tuesday morning without fail. She often asks herself, “What does this effort mean?” Then, speaking with yet another weary migrant, she asks permission to photograph and heads home to write another account of the real border.
Our beloved Peg died on December 27, 2020. Celebrate her inspiring life by reading Peg's obituary.